Monday, October 31, 2016

Tammy Grimes, the throaty actress and singer who
conquered Broadway at the age of 26, winning a Tony Award for her performance
in “The Unsinkable Molly Brown,” and went on to a distinguished stage career,
died on Sunday in Englewood, N.J. She was 82.

The death was confirmed by Duncan MacArthur, her nephew.

Ms. Grimes was largely unknown in 1960 when she was cast
as Molly, the rags-to-riches turn-of-the-century socialite-philanthropist who
survived the sinking of the Titanic. The show’s producers, who clearly
considered the music and lyrics by Meredith Willson more marketable than their
female lead, declined to put her name above the title, which meant that
(because of the Tony regulations of the time) she could be nominated only in
the featured-actress category.

Her second Tony, for a 1969 revival of Noël Coward’s
“Private Lives,” was decidedly for lead actress. Clive Barnes, writing in The
New York Times, called Ms. Grimes’s interpretation of her character, the
reluctant 1930s divorcée Amanda Prynne, “outrageously appealing” and “so
ridiculously artificial that she just has to be for real.”

Coward was a major influence on Ms. Grimes’s career. In
1958, he saw her performing at the Manhattan nightclub Downstairs at the
Upstairs and cast her as the lead in “Look After Lulu,” a new comedy he had
adapted from a Feydeau farce. In 1964 she appeared in “High Spirits,” a musical
version of Coward’s “Blithe Spirit” (directed but not written by Coward),
playing the ghost of the leading man’s first wife. The cast included Beatrice
Lillie as a medium trying to summon her and Edward Woodward as the husband. It
was one of more than a dozen Broadway productions in which Ms. Grimes starred.

Her mop of blond-red hair, a pointed chin, a wide mouth
and a ski-slope nose that was often compared to Bob Hope’s gave her a
distinctive look.

“I never looked like an ingénue,” Ms. Grimes acknowledged
in a 1960 interview with The New York Times Magazine. But that didn’t matter to
her, she said, because “I don’t want to be America’s Sweetheart; I’d rather be
something they don’t quite understand.”

Tammy Lee Grimes was born in Lynn, Mass., on Jan. 30,
1934, the second of three children of Luther Nichols Grimes, who managed the
Brookline Country Club, and the former Eola Willard Niles. Many fans believed
Ms. Grimes was British, partly because of her Mid-Atlantic accent, which she
attributed to a finishing-school education.

She attended Beaver Country Day School in Chestnut Hill,
Mass., and graduated from Stephens College in Missouri, which she often said
she had chosen because of its drama program. Then she went to work for the
Westport Country Playhouse in Connecticut and studied acting at the
Neighborhood Playhouse in New York, where the playwright Anita Loos saw her in
a student presentation and chose her for the title role in “The Amazing Adele.”

That show closed during out-of-town tryouts but did get
Ms. Grimes noticed. So did her Off Broadway debut, in “The Littlest Revue,” a
1956 musical production whose cast also included Joel Grey.

Critics loved Ms. Grimes from the beginning. Howard
Taubman hated “The Unsinkable Molly Brown” but praised Ms. Grimes as its
“buoyant interpreter” in introducing lively, often comic song-and-dance numbers
like “Belly Up to the Bar, Boys” and “I Ain’t Down Yet.”

Walter Kerr compared her more than once to a stormy force
of nature. Of her 1976 performance in Neil Simon’s “California Suite,” he
wrote, “Everything out of her face is thunderously funny,” and a year later he
reported that as Elmire in “Tartuffe” she called down “laughs sharp as
thunderclaps.”

Ms. Grimes made films, including “Play It as It Lays,”
“The Last Unicorn” and “Slaves of New York,” and appeared in dozens of
television movies and series (including her own short-lived sitcom, “The Tammy
Grimes Show,” in 1966). But the starring role in the film version of “Molly
Brown” (1964) went to Debbie Reynolds, who had a more traditional Hollywood
look and sound.

The stage was Ms. Grimes’s first home. The Off Broadway
productions in which she starred included Marc Blitzstein’s “The Cradle Will
Rock,” at City Center in 1960, and a 1979 Roundabout Theater production of
Turgenev’s “A Month in the Country” with her daughter, Amanda Plummer. Ms.
Grimes also worked at the Stratford Festival in Ontario, performing at least
once with her first husband, Christopher Plummer; in “Henry IV, Part I” (1958),
he was Bardolph and she was Mistress Quickly.

Ms. Grimes said she fell in love with Mr. Plummer after
seeing him on Broadway in “The Dark Is Light Enough” (1955), a comedy in which
he played a 19th-century Hungarian count. They married in 1956 and divorced in
1960. She married Jeremy Slate, a television actor, in 1966, and they divorced
the next year. She was with her third husband, the musician and composer
Richard Bell, from 1971 until his death in 2005. Ms. Grimes is survived by her
brother, Nick, and her daughter.

She quickly developed a reputation for star attitude. In
1961, Earl Wilson referred to her in his New York Post column as
“terrible-tempered Tammy Grimes” and reported that she had been known to “hit
or bite her fellow actors.” Sometimes she was more politely called mercurial.

In an interview with The Christian Science Monitor in
1980, she addressed that perception. “Well, I was very young,” she said. “It’s
difficult to know what to do with success when you’re so young.”

Her last feature film role was as Ally Sheedy’s Old World
mother in “High Art” (1998). Her final Broadway appearance was a supporting
role in a revival of Tennessee Williams’s “Orpheus Descending” (1989) starring
Vanessa Redgrave.

In 2003 Ms. Grimes was part of the rotating cast of “24
Evenings of Wit and Wisdom,” a production of Off Broadway readings about aging.
At the time, she told a writer for Theatermania that she was “about as
ambitious as a water buffalo.”

Her voice, once described as a “lyric baritone,” also
aged, but if it became whispery it also remained strong, as she demonstrated in
2010 with “Miss Tammy Grimes: Favorite Songs and Stories,” a solo cabaret show
at the Metropolitan Room in Manhattan.

In a 1964 interview with The Saturday Evening Post, Ms.
Grimes speculated about old age and a life that she fully intended to dedicate
to work. “Perhaps all you have left in the end is a scrapbook filled with old
newspaper clippings,” she said.

She quickly reconsidered, however, sounding a bit like
the debutante she once was. “If things get too bad,” she added, “well, there
are always far-off cities and cowboys with guitars, new clothes, music boxes
and large funds of traveler’s checks.”

The actor was 62 years old, has long suffered from a
serious illness. Józsa Imre was born in Budapest on 18 March 1954. He received
a degree from The Theatre and Film Academy in 1978. Then contracted at the Attila
József Theatre.

He appeared in theater and films, as well as being a
voice actor whose voice was often heard. He was the Hungarian voice of Nicolas
Cage, Chevy Chase and was the voice of South Park’s Mr. Garrison. About the
role in an interview, he said: "According to the feedback, many people
love South Park Garrison Lord of teachers as well. This role and genre is
absolutely not my thing, but perhaps that's why the task is a challenge. "

The actor won the Jászai Mari Prize in 1988, and was
awarded in 1997 the Order of Merit of the Hungarian Republic Small Cross. (MTI)

Sunday, October 30, 2016

September 18, 1926 - October 13, 2016 Ray Alba died
October 13, 2016 in Sherman Oaks, California, at the age of 90. His wife,
Annabelle Alba, was at his side. The pair were partners and best friends for 50
years, married happily for 38. When he was younger, Ray worked as a lifeguard
in Santa Monica and Venice Beach and was on the swim team at Hollywood High.
Between high school and college Ray enlisted in the Navy, serving in the
Pacific during World War II. He saved the life of a fellow sailor who had fallen
off the ship and was caught in a riptide. Ray jumped in and rescued him,
winning a commendation for his bravery. Ray went to UCLA to swim, but ended up
playing basketball under Coach John Wooden. He majored in Literature to pursue
his love of reading. Ray started his career as a sound editor working, without
credit, on one scene in "Vertigo." Over the course of his career he
worked on nearly 50 movies and television shows, including the movie
"Rocky," for which he was nominated for an Oscar. He was working for
Stephen J. Cannell when he retired from television and went into business with
a partner working in films. He was a voting member of the Academy and he
carried the torch in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics. His main passions were wine
and food. He was a member of the Westwood Wine and Food Society and greatly
enjoyed the monthly meetings. He worked out every day into his early eighties,
going to Bruce Connor's Gym or running from Brentwood to the ocean and back
again. He celebrated his 90th birthday dining at a nice restaurant with his
friends and family. He is survived by his wife, Annabelle; brother, Victor
Manjarrez; stepdaughter, Mary-Anne King; granddaughter, Megan Kandell and her
husband, Michael Ehler; and great-grandson, Jack Kandell-Ehler.

Saturday, October 29, 2016

Norman Brokaw, who pioneered the mailroom-to-agent route
in Hollywood and went on to become chairman of the William Morris Agency, has
died. He was 89. Brokaw was one of the last of his generation of agents of that
era, working alongside Abe Lastfogel, Stan Kamen, Morris Stoller and (the often
despised) Sammy Weisbord. He and Kamen basically built the William Morris
television department from scratch.

Brokaw took over the career of Marilyn Monroe after his
Uncle Johnny Hyde died. It was his Uncle Johnny who brought “Normie” into the
mailroom at the agency. After four years slaving away there, Brokaw was
promoted to a secretary and then an agent before he was hand-picked to start
the television department in Los Angeles. He helped push the William Morris clients
to crossover from film to TV and worked personally with Danny Thomas. Kamen
worked with Sheldon Leonard. And all four — the two agents and Thomas and
Leonard –became power in television. Brokaw helped putpackages together for T&L Productions
which produced The Danny Thomas Show, The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Real McCoys,
The Andy Griffith Show and its spin-off Gomer Pyle. He and Weisbord worked
together to package popular TV shows like The Mod Squad.

He was also Bill Cosby’s agent and as such, was instrumental
in getting the young comedian cast on I Spy and eventually spearheaded deals
that led to The Cosby Show.

Brokaw was considered one the giants of his generation
and he helped as an agent on what was a who’s who of Hollywood and beyond —
among them Marilyn Monroe, Barbara Stanwyck, Loretta Young, Mark Spitz, Clint
Eastwood (Len Hirshan took him over), Andy Griffith, Kim Novak, Natalie Wood,
President Gerald Ford, Tony Orlando, Priscilla Presley, Tony Randall, Hank
Aaron, Marcia Clark and Christoper Darden, and Brooke Shields.

Brokaw’s son, David, confirmed his father died today in
Beverly Hills after a long illness.

Brokaw began working for William Morris in 1943 at 15 as
its first trainee. He eventually was was elected President and CEO in February
1989, and two years later was named Chairman and CEO.

Brokaw was immensely proud of his achievements, and
chafed at being overlooked as players like Michael Ovitz and Ron Meyer gobbled
up attention in the 1980s and ’90s. Once, he threatened to sue a Los Angeles
Times reporter for leaving him off an agency power list, raising the prospect
of an unusual claim for libel by omission. Instead, he invited the reporter to
lunch at the Hillcrest Country Club, and read aloud from a manuscript story of
his life over desert.

In 2010, Brokaw received the TV Academy’s Governors Award
on Brokaw — the only agent to be given the group’s highest honor.

Friday, October 28, 2016

Legendary New York based horror host John Zacherle (aka
Zacherley) passes away at age 98

Unfortunately news to glean just before Halloween, but a
man who devoted much of his life to monster culture, iconic TV horror movie
host John Zacherle passed away yesterday. He was 98.

Zacherle – or simply Zacherley, as he best known as, was
instrumental in creating the “monster kid” movement of the 1950’s, first as the
host of New York’s WCAU’s Shock Theater as the character Roland, where he
screened classic horror films and “interrupted” them with stylized, campy
shtick that both quoted and mocked the movies in question. This format would
later be copied by a myriad “horror hosts”. Later, during his run at
Philadelphia’s WABC-TV, he changed the name of his character to Zacherley, “The
Cool Ghoul”. Zacherle would continue evolving this persona in a myriad mediums
throughout the 1960s and 70s as well as appearing in film, television and radio
as an actor.

Zacherle is also well known to cult film fans for his
blackly funny turn giving voice to the brain sucking parasite Aylmer in Frank
Henenlotter‘s gory cult classic Brain Damage. He continued to work and appear
at conventions almost right until the point of his death.

Zacherle’s impact on horror was substantial and he will
be missed by many. We send our love to all of his fans to and to the friends
and family who knew him best.

About Me

Born in Toledo, Ohio in 1946 I have a BA degree in American History from Cal St. Northridge. I've been researching the American West and western films since the early 1980s and visiting filming sites in Spain and the U.S.A. Elected a member of the Spaghetti Western Hall of Fame 2010.